Closing defense argument in former Marine’s chokehold trial: ‘They failed to prove case’

Daniel Penny’s defense team told a Manhattan jury Monday that prosecutors fell well short of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the former Marine is guilty of manslaughter in the May 2023 death of homeless man Jordan Neely aboard a Manhattan subway train.

“This was not a chokehold death,” defense attorney Stephen Raiser said. “They failed to prove their case, period.”

Mr. Penny, 26, faces up to 15 years, if convicted.

The high-profile case has garnered national attention over whether Mr. Penny was a good Samaritan who confronted a dangerous man during an erratic episode, or a racist vigilante who took the law into his own hands. Mr. Penny is White, and the 30-year-old Neely was Black.

The monthlong trial featured testimony from subway passengers, police officers, medical experts and the defendant’s family and fellow Corps members.

Trial testimony revealed that Neely got on the F train in May 2023, whipped off his jacket and launched into a rant about how he was hungry and ready to spend the rest of his life in prison.

Passengers testified that Neely’s raving was “satanic” and his jerky, lunge-like movements around the car “scared the living daylights” out of them. Other passengers, however, said they weren’t frightened by his outburst and felt Mr. Penny kept his hold on Neely for too long.

What role the chokehold played in Neely’s death is the central part of the trial.

Prosecutors argued that Mr. Penny had laudable intentions when he stepped in to restrain Neely, but the ex-Marine took it too far by choking the vagrant for nearly six minutes. Neely went limp in the final minute of Mr. Penny’s hold.

Dr. Cynthia Harris, the medical examiner who conducted the homeless man’s autopsy, testified previously that “there are no alternative reasonable explanations for Mr. Neely’s death.”

She ruled Neely died from compression of the neck due to the defendant’s chokehold. Dr. Harris added that Mr. Penny’s actions would have killed the vagrant even if Neely had enough drugs in his system “to put down an elephant.”

Mr. Raiser, the defense attorney, argued Neely died from a high amount of synthetic cannabinoid K2 in his system and complications arising from schizophrenia and a sickle cell trait.

The defense said Mr. Penny’s hold was done to restrain the “violent and desperate” Neely and not kill him — a perspective supported by the former Marine’s police interrogation conducted just hours after the incident. Mr. Raiser added that Neely never tried to pull Mr. Penny’s arm from around his neck because he wasn’t choking him.

Neely had impersonated Michael Jackson in street performances, and his family said he struggled with drug addiction. The vagrant had been arrested more than 40 times in the past decade, including for assaulting a woman in her 60s and kidnapping a 7-year-old girl.

Mr. Penny served four years in the Marines before being discharged in 2021. The Long Island native was looking for work as a bartender when the incident happened.